primitiae Latin · revision 34553

+ {{infobox|confidence=probable|formation=derivation|attested=c. 234–149 BC, Cato (possibly)|origins=la prīmus}}

+

+ ==Forms==

+ '''prīmitiae''' ''f pl'' (genitive prīmitiārum); first declension^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879)

+ A singular ''prīmitia'' is rare: the Vetus Latina has it, and Commodian uses the ablative.^(Georges 1913)^(TLL)

+

+ ==Etymology==

+ It is [[af|la|prīmus|-tia|t1=first]].^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913)^(Bianchi & Lelli 2014) The TLL notes that most scholars derive it from [[m|la|prīmus]], but since in some religious passages it seems to mean the same as [[m|la|praemetium|t=first fruits reaped before the general harvest]], it suggests that the word may go back to the root of [[m|la|metō|t=to reap]], the sense “beginning” arising later.^(TLL)

+

+ De Vaan traces [[m|la|prīmus]] to [[itc-pro|*prī̆-isamo-|t=first]], a superlative built on an adverb meaning “before”, whose Indo-European ancestry he calls uncertain.^(de Vaan 2008)

+

+ ==Earliest recorded meaning==

+ The TLL finds it perhaps already in Cato, and certainly in single passages of Gannius and Virgil;^(TLL) it meant the first fruits of the harvest offered to a god.^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879)

+

+ ==Semantic evolution==

+ Ovid writes of spelt cut as first fruits for Ceres, and Pliny the Elder of offering first fruits to the gods.^(Lewis & Short 1879)^(Conte 2010) Virgil widened it to any first offering, calling spoils taken from a proud king ''primitiae'', and to beginnings, the “first fruits” of a young man's unhappy first war.^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913) Tacitus speaks of the first pieces of unworked metal, Columella of the first shoots of the vine, and Petronius has ''a primitiis'' “from the very start”.^(OLD 2012)^(Conte 2010)

+

+ The Vulgate uses it in Exodus for first fruits,^(Lewis & Short 1879)^(Conte 2010) and it became a common Ecclesiastical word.^(Stelten 1995)^(TLL) In medieval Latin it named first fruits brought to the altar, the revenue a church drew from them, and small tithes.^(Niermeyer 1976) Bede uses it of the first fruits of crops and animals consecrated to God.^(DMLBS)

+

+ ==Timeline==

+ * 234–149 BC – Cato perhaps uses it, according to the TLL.^(TLL)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of a first offering of spoils and of the beginnings of a war.^(OLD 2012)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it of first fruits for Ceres.^(Lewis & Short 1879)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * 98–115 AD – Tacitus speaks of the first pieces of unworked metal.^(Georges 1913)^(Conte 2010)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses it in Exodus for first fruits.^(Lewis & Short 1879)^(Köbler 2010)

+

+ ==Meanings==

+ ===Noun===

+ # [[m|en|first fruits|alt=First fruits]] of the harvest, offered to a god;^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879) a first offering of other things.^(OLD 2012)

+ # ''(figurative)'' The beginnings, the first results or experience of something.^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913)^(Conte 2010)

+ # ''a primitiis'': from the very start.^(OLD 2012)^(Conte 2010)

+ # ''(Medieval Latin)'' The revenue a church drew from offerings of first fruits; small [[m|en|tithe|alt=tithes]].^(Niermeyer 1976)

+

+ ==Word family==

+ * [[prīmitīvus]]

+

+ ==Related words==

+ * [[prīmus]]

+ * [[prīmitus]]

+

+ ==References==

+ {{reflist}}